William Hayes is a New England–based oil painter whose work moves fluidly between landscapes, seascapes, architecture, figurative scenes, and imaginative subjects such as robots and surreal visual narratives. Drawing loosely from impressionism, surrealism, and realism, his paintings often carry a subtle, cartoon-like sensibility. Rather than adhering to a fixed style, Hayes works intuitively, allowing each painting to evolve on its own terms.

Born in Northern Maine and raised in Beverly Massachusetts, Hayes moved to New Hampshire and has been a resident since 1997. He was introduced to oil painting at an early age when his father gave him a painting set in the early 1980s—an experience that sparked a lifelong engagement with drawing and painting, even as his creative path expanded into music.

As a teenager and young adult, Hayes was deeply involved in music, performing in bands for many years. A multi-instrumentalist, he played guitar, banjo, fiddle, and bass, immersing himself in the energy of live performance and its surrounding creative culture. Music remained central throughout his teens, twenties and thirties. In his late thirties, Hayes stepped away from the nightlife of musicianship, drawn toward the quieter, more solitary process of painting. What had once been intermittent, became a focused and consistent studio practice. He chooses to focus on the act of painting itself, guided by a belief in the quiet power of visual artwork that does not demand attention, but instead invites viewers to discover it on their own terms, whether encountered in person or online.